jackaroo
/ˌdʒakəˈruː
/(also jackeroo) Australian /NZ informal
noun
A young man working on a sheep or cattle station to gain experience.It's some years since I was last here, when I was sent to work as a teenage jackaroo on a 36,000-acre station with 30,000 sheep for company....
- The sun is low in the sky as jackaroos on motorbikes muster a mob of weaner rams along the picturesque Egelabra lagoon.
- Aides are hoping the media frenzy surrounding 19-year-old Harry will subside and confirmed he would remain at the Tooloombilla Station in Queensland state where he will learn to be a jackaroo, an Australian cowboy.
verb
(usually jackeroo) [no object] Work as a jackaroo.The youth is sent to a farm to learn jackarooing, for which he has no aptitude, sleeping in the shed with rats and terrorised by a part-mad farmer's wife....
- One does get the impression that he seemed to be searching for something, like he was always on the move a bit, from jackarooing to working in the rodeos, to chicken boning, kangaroo skinning; is that a fair assessment?
- I visited and I used to spend all my school holidays out there jackarooing, working on properties in the Harden district, and that gave me the real urge to go bush.
Origin
Late 19th century: perhaps a blend of jack1 and kangaroo.